By now you are probably familiar with the phrase structural integrity as it's a phrase I use a lot and some of you probably aren't familiar with the phrase nor understand what I mean when I use it, so let me explain it in more depth.
We have learned that there are many joints in the body and by now you should understand the structure, functions and importance of these joints. However let me touch more on the importance of maintaining the structural integrity of these joints. What do I mean by structural integrity? Well our body is a complex and intricate structure as you know by now... Therefore when I mention structural integrity I am referring our anatomical shape. During the evolution of the human race our anatomy evolved to adapt to its environment. Therefore this meant obtaining an upright spine enabling us to walk upright on two legs. It also meant obtaining the use of our thumbs to use tools, etc... Therefore we have essentially self designed our anatomical shape through evolving to meet the means of our environment. That's structural integrity! The hard job is maintaining it.
Over time, as we get older and grow, our body shapes can change based on our environment or the tasks we undergo on a daily basis, therefore this can prohibit maintaining structural integrity. In many ways structural integrity is our posture. We are designed to have curves in our spine, a forward facing head, balanced weight on either side of our hips, forward facing toes, etc... We are also designed to have a wide range of motion around these joints. Take into consideration a new born baby, the purest form of nature in the human race. A new born baby is born with more cartilage than bones, roughly 300-350 parts of cartilage. By the time they have finished adolescence and are in their mid twenties they have 206 bones that have fused together via cartilage. This allows the baby to be very flexible as they have no rigid structures preventing this... However I invite you to imagine this scenario. By the age of ten, that once new born baby has developed a restriction of motion when bending down to touch their toes, however when that ten year old was five he made it look easy! Well the reason he could touch his toes at five and not ten is because his refined and under developed muscles have created muscular imbalances that have prevented this action occurring. Well at such a young age, increasing range of movement at a joint isn't too difficult. However, how many of you can touch your toes?
This blog isn't to have a go at you, and I say touch your toes because its a basic movement to show flexibility. However for those of you who can't whats happened is you have most likely developed lower cross syndrome. Sounds scary right? Well it's not and in fact with a little more care and therapy on your anatomy it can be cured. Lower cross syndrome is when you have hypertonic (short and over active) muscles and the opposite muscles being either your antagonist or agonist muscles have switched off making them hypotonic (long and weak). However this is where it can have a detrimental effect on our anatomy pulling our anatomy out of alignment. For example it may be having hypertonic hip flexors and hypotonic glutes pulling our pelvis forward, creating an anterior pelvic tilt. You could also have tight pectorals and traps and weak neck flexors and rhomboids creating a hyper kyphotic curve within the thoracic spine. Essentially the muscle that is hypertonic means that the opposite muscle slowly becomes hypotonic and therefore our hypertonic muscles pull the body out of alignment.
I touch upon this issue as its more often than not overlooked and in fact if we give our anatomy therapy it will help us maintain structural integrity, and maintain full range of motion around our joints like most of us could when we were younger thus ironing out these muscular imbalances. How, you might be asking? Well I touched on it briefly in a previous blog, and its quite simple. Things such as massage therapy are great as it irons out all those muscular imbalances. Also yoga is a great healer of the body and allows for a greater range of motion around our joints. Or something as simple as stretching and not sitting down in one place for too long is an easy and effective activity to do. I'd also invite you to do this. Be conscious of your anatomical shape as often as possible and if it needs altering then make those changes instantly. This will allow you to develop good habits and iron out bad habits through good practice. A key area to stretch is your hip flexors as most of us sit down at some part of the day, some of us may work in offices and therefore we are sitting down most of the day. This will create tension in your gluteal muscles when stretching preventing them from becoming hypotonic and restrict tension in your hip flexors preventing them from becoming hypertonic.
MAINTAIN STRUCTURAL INTEGRITY!
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